Glazed Mini-Rounds

Ah prep bowls, I've missed you.

I think it's a good idea when you get to the end of this post if you scroll back up and see how pretty and organized I began this recipe. In fact it ended so messily and not yummy that I'm not even going to post the recipe. I doubt this will inspire anyone to try to make these buggers anyway.

I've never used my sifter/strainer so much in one recipe. I often skip sifting ingredients - I know, bad baker, bad! This icing sugar was pretty chunky looking so I gave it a go:

The recipe specifically said to make sure you smoothed the top of the cake batter prior to baking. I really thought I had, but looking back at this photo (and the final product) I'm beginning to think otherwise.

You see, this here, this isn't smooth.

After baking I was to cut the cake in half, smear with a (strained!) apricot jam and place the pieces back together again. Julia off-handedly told me to use my 1 inch circle cookie cutter. Yeah, I don't have one of those. My dear husband made a run up to Degrees to help me out. I told him before leaving that it didn't need to be more than an inch high because my cake would be cut in half. I forgot that I had to put the cake back together again before cutting out the circle shapes. So I had the brilliant idea to just cut out the circles on the halves separately and then stick them together. It sort of worked, sort of didn't. I think the main problem was the top of the cake was a little rough and firm, so I didn't achieve perfect circles.

Next up we melted a bunch of chocolate. First the white chocolate was turned into a glaze and poured over the little wee cakes.

Next I melted the dark chocolate and poured it into a Ziploc bag with a wee hole snipped in the end. This was my ghetto way of decorating, not the most accurate thing in the world. And holy crap, did you know that melted chocolate held in your fist is HOT? Because it is. You have to trust that my hand is burning in this photo.

This it the mess I made:

And this is the final product:

And those are glazed mini rounds. I don't know if I am the best judge, because I don't care for white chocolate - but these weren't that great. They tasted like pound cake coated in chocolate. But worse.

When this recipe said that these would taste like a mixture of cookies and brownies I wanted to french kiss Julia Child... because that sounds like my idea of heaven.

Seriously though, that's a lot of fucking chocolate:




When you get right down to it... there's a pound of chocolate in these cookies.

I have never before purchased instant coffee. I wasn't even really sure what it looked like. Apparently something like this:


I melted down half of that chocolate while whipping up things in my mixer:


This is the first recipe I remember where they haven't said "or using a hand held mixer"...


Everything was all mixed up and put in the fridge overnight. It was quite the transformation from fluffy chocolate-y marshmallow-y bowl of yummy to this:


All that stuff that looks like it's dripping down the sides? It's just frozen in time there. Totally hard. The dough itself, and I have a hard time calling it that, was mostly just hard on top and then it was pliable under that surface.


Let's be real. Basically this is melted chocolate, re-hardened and melted again into cookie shape. It's a POUND of chocolate. Did I mention that?


I was quite serious with my measuring. I didn't want to end up with one giant cookie. Because I'd eat it. By myself. In two seconds. And no one wants to see what I look like after eating a POUND of chocolate in two seconds.

My pictures are getting progressively worse because normally I rely on natural sunlight in my shots. This is what it looked like outside:


So after measuring and baking I was to rotate 5 minutes after putting them in the oven. This is what the cookies looked like half baked:


Honestly, I know this is a food blog and all... but if you took that and put it on the floor... I would take my dog to the vet.

I think the detailed directions of what the cookies should look like made me overcook my first batch. I kept waiting for them to fall, instead they stayed all puffy... until I took them out of the oven. Also while scooping dough in from the bottom of my bowl I noticed there was flour visible around all the chocolate chunks. Which surprisingly didn't affect the taste at all. I think I ate about 6 of these today. If they weren't making me feel nauseous I'd eat the rest because they are exactly a cross between cookies and brownies - heaven.

Double Chocolate Cookies

Adapted from "Baking With Julia"

½ cup all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
12 ounces bittersweet chocolate, cut into larger than chip size chunks
1 stick (4 ounces) unsalted butter
4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, coarsely chopped
4 large eggs, at room temperature
1½ cups sugar
1½ tablespoons instant coffee powder
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl and set aside until needed. Divide the bittersweet chocolate in half and set half aside.

2. Place the butter, the remaining bittersweet chocolate, and the unsweetened chocolate in the top of a double boiler over, but not touching, simmering water. Heat the mixture, stirring occasionally, until the butter and chocolates are melted and smooth. Remove from the heat.

3. Meanwhile, put the eggs, sugar, coffee and vanilla in the bowl of a mixer fitted with the whisk attachment and beat at high speed for about 10 minutes, until the mixture is very thick and forms a slowly dissolving ribbon when the whisk is lifted and the mixture is allowed to drizzle back into the bowl.

4. With the mixer on low speed, very gradually add the warm butter-chocolate mixture. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and work your rubber spatula around the bottom of the bowl, then continue to mix just until the chocolate is thoroughly incorporated. Add the dry ingredients and the remaining bittersweet chocolate chunks and mix thoroughly. The mixture will look like a thick, marshmallowy cake batter.

5. Chilling the dough: Cover the bowl with plastic and chill for several hours, or overnight. The dough can be made ahead and kept refrigerated for up to 4 days.

6. Baking the cookies: When you are ready to bake, position the racks to divide the oven into thirds and preheat the oven to 350˚F. Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper.

7. Using a heaping tablespoon of dough for each cookie, drop the dough onto the lined sheets, leaving at least 2 inches of space between each mound of dough – these are spreaders. Bake the cookies for 10 to 12 minutes, rotating the pans front to back and top to bottom halfway through the baking period. The cookies will puff, then sink and crinkle and wrinkle around the edges. These cookies are better underdone than overbaked, so if you have any doubts, pull them out of the oven earlier rather than later. These shouldn’t appear dry and they won’t be crisp. Use a wide metal spatula to transfer the cookies to cooling racks to cool to room temperature. Repeat with the remaining dough.

8. Storing: The cookies can be wrapped in plastic and kept at room temperature for 2 days or frozen for up to a month. Thaw, still wrapped, at room temperature.